41 C.F.R. Subpart B—Purpose and Contents of Affirmative Action Programs
Title 41 - Public Contracts and Property Management
(a) Purpose. (1) An affirmative action program is a management tool designed to ensure equal employment opportunity. A central premise underlying affirmative action is that, absent discrimination, over time a contractor's workforce, generally, will reflect the gender, racial and ethnic profile of the labor pools from which the contractor recruits and selects. Affirmative action programs contain a diagnostic component which includes a number of quantitative analyses designed to evaluate the composition of the workforce of the contractor and compare it to the composition of the relevant labor pools. Affirmative action programs also include action-oriented programs. If women and minorities are not being employed at a rate to be expected given their availability in the relevant labor pool, the contractor's affirmative action program includes specific practical steps designed to address this underutilization. Effective affirmative action programs also include internal auditing and reporting systems as a means of measuring the contractor's progress toward achieving the workforce that would be expected in the absence of discrimination. (2) An affirmative action program also ensures equal employment opportunity by institutionalizing the contractor's commitment to equality in every aspect of the employment process. Therefore, as part of its affirmative action program, a contractor monitors and examines its employment decisions and compensation systems to evaluate the impact of those systems on women and minorities. (3) An affirmative action program is, thus, more than a paperwork exercise. An affirmative action program includes those policies, practices, and procedures that the contractor implements to ensure that all qualified applicants and employees are receiving an equal opportunity for recruitment, selection, advancement, and every other term and privilege associated with employment. Affirmative action, ideally, is a part of the way the contractor regularly conducts its business. OFCCP has found that when an affirmative action program is approached from this perspective, as a powerful management tool, there is a positive correlation between the presence of affirmative action and the absence of discrimination. (b) Contents of affirmative action programs. (1) An affirmative action program must include the following quantitative analyses: (i) Organizational profile—§60–2.11; (ii) Job group analysis—§60–2.12; (iii) Placement of incumbents in job groups—§60–2.13; (iv) Determining availability—§60–2.14; (v) Comparing incumbency to availability—§60–2.15; and (vi) Placement goals—§60–2.16. (2) In addition, an affirmative action program must include the following components specified in the §60–2.17 of this part: (i) Designation of responsibility for implementation; (ii) Identification of problem areas; (iii) Action-oriented programs; and (iv) Periodic internal audits. (c) Documentation. Contractors must maintain and make available to OFCCP documentation of their compliance with §§60–2.11 through 60–2.17. (a) Purpose. An organizational profile is a depiction of the staffing pattern within an establishment. It is one method contractors use to determine whether barriers to equal employment opportunity exist in their organizations. The profile provides an overview of the workforce at the establishment that may assist in identifying organizational units where women or minorities are underrepresented or concentrated. The contractor must use either the organizational display or the workforce analysis as its organizational profile: (b) Organizational display. (1) An organizational display is a detailed graphical or tabular chart, text, spreadsheet or similar presentation of the contractor's organizational structure. The organizational display must identify each organizational unit in the establishment, and show the relationship of each organizational unit to the other organizational units in the establishment. (2) An organizational unit is any component that is part of the contractor's corporate structure. In a more traditional organization, an organizational unit might be a department, division, section, branch, group or similar component. In a less traditional organization, an organizational unit might be a project team, job family, or similar component. The term includes an umbrella unit (such as a department) that contains a number of subordinate units, and it separately includes each of the subordinate units (such as sections or branches). (3) For each organizational unit, the organizational display must indicate the following: (i) The name of the unit; (ii) The job title, gender, race, and ethnicity of the unit supervisor (if the unit has a supervisor); (iii) The total number of male and female incumbents; and (iv) the total number of male and female incumbents in each of the following groups: Blacks, Hispanics, Asians/Pacific Islanders, and American Indians/Alaskan Natives. (c) Workforce analysis. (1) A workforce analysis is a listing of each job title as appears in applicable collective bargaining agreements or payroll records ranked from the lowest paid to the highest paid within each department or other similar organizational unit including departmental or unit supervision. (2) If there are separate work units or lines of progression within a department, a separate list must be provided for each such work unit, or line, including unit supervisors. For lines of progression there must be indicated the order of jobs in the line through which an employee could move to the top of the line. (3) Where there are no formal progression lines or usual promotional sequences, job titles should be listed by department, job families, or disciplines, in order of wage rates or salary ranges. (4) For each job title, the total number of incumbents, the total number of male and female incumbents, and the total number of male and female incumbents in each of the following groups must be given: Blacks, Hispanics, Asians/Pacific Islanders, and American Indians/Alaskan Natives. The wage rate or salary range for each job title must be given. All job titles, including all managerial job titles, must be listed. (a) Purpose: A job group analysis is a method of combining job titles within the contractor's establishment. This is the first step in the contractor's comparison of the representation of minorities and women in its workforce with the estimated availability of minorities and women qualified to be employed. (b) In the job group analysis, jobs at the establishment with similar content, wage rates, and opportunities, must be combined to form job groups. Similarity of content refers to the duties and responsibilities of the job titles which make up the job group. Similarity of opportunities refers to training, transfers, promotions, pay, mobility, and other career enhancement opportunities offered by the jobs within the job group. (c) The job group analysis must include a list of the job titles that comprise each job group. If, pursuant to §§60–2.1(d) and (e) the job group analysis contains jobs that are located at another establishment, the job group analysis must be annotated to identify the actual location of those jobs. If the establishment at which the jobs actually are located maintains an affirmative action program, the job group analysis of that program must be annotated to identify the program in which the jobs are included. (d) Except as provided in §60–2.1(d), all jobs located at an establishment must be reported in the job group analysis of that establishment. (e) Smaller employers: If a contractor has a total workforce of fewer than 150 employees, the contractor may prepare a job group analysis that utilizes EEO–1 categories as job groups. EEO–1 categories refers to the nine occupational groups used in the Standard Form 100, the Employer Information EEO–1 Survey: Officials and managers, professionals, technicians, sales, office and clerical, craft workers (skilled), operatives (semiskilled), laborers (unskilled), and service workers. The contractor must separately state the percentage of minorities and the percentage of women it employs in each job group established pursuant to §60–2.12. (a) Purpose: Availability is an estimate of the number of qualified minorities or women available for employment in a given job group, expressed as a percentage of all qualified persons available for employment in the job group. The purpose of the availability determination is to establish a benchmark against which the demographic composition of the contractor's incumbent workforce can be compared in order to determine whether barriers to equal employment opportunity may exist within particular job groups. (b) The contractor must separately determine the availability of minorities and women for each job group. (c) In determining availability, the contractor must consider at least the following factors: (1) The percentage of minorities or women with requisite skills in the reasonable recruitment area. The reasonable recruitment area is defined as the geographical area from which the contractor usually seeks or reasonably could seek workers to fill the positions in question. (2) The percentage of minorities or women among those promotable, transferable, and trainable within the contractor's organization. Trainable refers to those employees within the contractor's organization who could, with appropriate training which the contractor is reasonably able to provide, become promotable or transferable during the AAP year. (d) The contractor must use the most current and discrete statistical information available to derive availability figures. Examples of such information include census data, data from local job service offices, and data from colleges or other training institutions. (e) The contractor may not draw its reasonable recruitment area in such a way as to have the effect of excluding minorities or women. For each job group, the reasonable recruitment area must be identified, with a brief explanation of the rationale for selection of that recruitment area. (f) The contractor may not define the pool of promotable, transferable, and trainable employees in such a way as to have the effect of excluding minorities or women. For each job group, the pool of promotable, transferable, and trainable employees must be identified with a brief explanation of the rationale for the selection of that pool. (g) Where a job group is composed of job titles with different availability rates, a composite availability figure for the job group must be calculated. The contractor must separately determine the availability for each job title within the job group and must determine the proportion of job group incumbents employed in each job title. The contractor must weight the availability for each job title by the proportion of job group incumbents employed in that job group. The sum of the weighted availability estimates for all job titles in the job group must be the composite availability for the job group. (a) The contractor must compare the percentage of minorities and women in each job group determined pursuant to §60–2.13 with the availability for those job groups determined pursuant to §60–2.14. (b) When the percentage of minorities or women employed in a particular job group is less than would reasonably be expected given their availability percentage in that particular job group, the contractor must establish a placement goal in accordance with §60–2.16. (a) Purpose: Placement goals serve as objectives or targets reasonably attainable by means of applying every good faith effort to make all aspects of the entire affirmative action program work. Placement goals also are used to measure progress toward achieving equal employment opportunity. (b) A contractor's determination under §60–2.15 that a placement goal is required constitutes neither a finding nor an admission of discrimination. (c) Where, pursuant to §60–2.15, a contractor is required to establish a placement goal for a particular job group, the contractor must establish a percentage annual placement goal at least equal to the availability figure derived for women or minorities, as appropriate, for that job group. (d) The placement goal-setting process described above contemplates that contractors will, where required, establish a single goal for all minorities. In the event of a substantial disparity in the utilization of a particular minority group or in the utilization of men or women of a particular minority group, a contractor may be required to establish separate goals for those groups. (e) In establishing placement goals, the following principles also apply: (1) Placement goals may not be rigid and inflexible quotas, which must be met, nor are they to be considered as either a ceiling or a floor for the employment of particular groups. Quotas are expressly forbidden. (2) In all employment decisions, the contractor must make selections in a nondiscriminatory manner. Placement goals do not provide the contractor with a justification to extend a preference to any individual, select an individual, or adversely affect an individual's employment status, on the basis of that person's race, color, religion, sex, or national origin. (3) Placement goals do not create set-asides for specific groups, nor are they intended to achieve proportional representation or equal results. (4) Placement goals may not be used to supersede merit selection principles. Affirmative action programs prescribed by the regulations in this part do not require a contractor to hire a person who lacks qualifications to perform the job successfully, or hire a less qualified person in preference to a more qualified one. (f) A contractor extending a publicly announced preference for American Indians as is authorized in 41 CFR 60–1.5(a)(6) may reflect in its placement goals the permissive employment preference for American Indians living on or near an Indian reservation. In addition to the elements required by §60–2.10 through §60–2.16, an acceptable affirmative action program must include the following: (a) Designation of responsibility. The contractor must provide for the implementation of equal employment opportunity and the affirmative action program by assigning responsibility and accountability to an official of the organization. Depending upon the size of the contractor, this may be the official's sole responsibility. He or she must have the authority, resources, support of and access to top management to ensure the effective implementation of the affirmative action program. (b) Identification of problem areas. The contractor must perform in-depth analyses of its total employment process to determine whether and where impediments to equal employment opportunity exist. At a minimum the contractor must evaluate: (1) The workforce by organizational unit and job group to determine whether there are problems of minority or female utilization (i.e., employment in the unit or group), or of minority or female distribution (i.e., placement in the different jobs within the unit or group); (2) Personnel activity (applicant flow, hires, terminations, promotions, and other personnel actions) to determine whether there are selection disparities; (3) Compensation system(s) to determine whether there are gender-, race-, or ethnicity-based disparities; (4) Selection, recruitment, referral, and other personnel procedures to determine whether they result in disparities in the employment or advancement of minorities or women; and (5) Any other areas that might impact the success of the affirmative action program. (c) Action-oriented programs. The contractor must develop and execute action-oriented programs designed to correct any problem areas identified pursuant to §60–2.17(b) and to attain established goals and objectives. In order for these action-oriented programs to be effective, the contractor must ensure that they consist of more than following the same procedures which have previously produced inadequate results. Furthermore, a contractor must demonstrate that it has made good faith efforts to remove identified barriers, expand employment opportunities, and produce measurable results. (d) Internal audit and reporting system. The contractor must develop and implement an auditing system that periodically measures the effectiveness of its total affirmative action program. The actions listed below are key to a successful affirmative action program: (1) Monitor records of all personnel activity, including referrals, placements, transfers, promotions, terminations, and compensation, at all levels to ensure the nondiscriminatory policy is carried out; (2) Require internal reporting on a scheduled basis as to the degree to which equal employment opportunity and organizational objectives are attained; (3) Review report results with all levels of management; and (4) Advise top management of program effectiveness and submit recommendations to improve unsatisfactory performance. (a) Survey requirement. Each year, OFCCP will designate a substantial portion of all nonconstruction contractor establishments to prepare and file an Equal Opportunity Survey. OFCCP will notify those establishments required to prepare and file the Equal Opportunity Survey. The Survey will provide OFCCP compliance data early in the compliance evaluation process, thus allowing the agency to more effectively identify contractor establishments for further evaluation. The Survey will also provide contractors with a useful tool for self-evaluation. (b) Survey format. The Equal Opportunity Survey must be prepared in accordance with the format specified by the Deputy Assistant Secretary. The Equal Opportunity Survey will include information that will allow for an accurate assessment of contractor personnel activities, pay practices, and affirmative action performance. At a minimum, this will include such data elements as applicants, hires, promotions, terminations, compensation, and tenure by race and gender. As use of the EO Survey develops and evolves, the Department may at some time determine that one or more of the data elements currently included in the EO Survey should be altered or deleted. In the event consideration is given to changing a data element requirement, the following circumstances must exist: (1) The Secretary must clearly demonstrate through statistical analyses of EO Survey submissions that the data element in question is no longer of value; and (2) The Secretary must follow Notice and Comment procedures. (c) How, when, and where to file. Contractors are encouraged to submit the Equal Opportunity Survey via the Internet. The Equal Opportunity Survey may also be submitted via facsimile to the telephone number indicated in the Survey instructions. Paper versions of the Equal Opportunity Survey must be mailed to the address indicated in the Survey instructions. The filing deadline will be specified by the Deputy Assistant Secretary. (d) Confidentiality. OFCCP will treat information contained in the Equal Opportunity Survey as confidential to the maximum extent the information is exempt from public disclosure under the Freedom of Information Act, 5 U.S.C. 552. It is the practice of OFCCP not to release data where the contractor is still in business, and the contractor indicates, and through the Department of Labor review process it is determined, that the data are confidential and sensitive and that the release of data would subject the contractor to commercial harm.
Title 41: Public Contracts and Property Management
PART 60–2—AFFIRMATIVE ACTION PROGRAMS
Subpart B—Purpose and Contents of Affirmative Action Programs
§ 60-2.10 General purpose and contents of affirmative action programs.
§ 60-2.11 Organizational profile.
§ 60-2.12 Job group analysis.
§ 60-2.13 Placement of incumbents in job groups.
§ 60-2.14 Determining availability.
§ 60-2.15 Comparing incumbency to availability.
§ 60-2.16 Placement goals.
§ 60-2.17 Additional required elements of affirmative action programs.
§ 60-2.18 Equal Opportunity Survey.
